Google Fiber puts old ad in new Super Bowl slot

Google (Nasdaq: GOOG) Fiber is taking an old subscriber recruiting ad and giving it a glamorous new twist by inserting it into the mix of big-name commercials parading across TVs during Sunday's Super Bowl.

The time slot "among Sunday's pride-of-the-industry parade of commercials signals how eager Google is to compete in Kansas City," a story in Wednesday's Kansas City Star said.

Google Fiber has, thus far, only rolled out in a handful of communities in the two Kansas Cities (Kansas and Missouri), with a combination of ultra-high-speed broadband and television. The launch has been peppered with controversy and hiccups as Google and incumbent operator Time Warner Cable (NYSE: TWC) argue over local sports programming, among other things.

Sports, it appears, is the foundation of the ad, which uses a local athlete and former local sports anchor to offer "atmospherics about Google Fiber without explaining to the uninitiated that the service is anchored by ultrafast broadband Internet," the newspaper story said.

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